Every Bright Thing
by cryptically
Summary: Missing scenes: how really did Kanie get the park back in working order in three months time? Kanifa with hints of Kanto. Aspires to be semi-canon, but makes no promises.


It would have been better as a dream, he thinks.

Sento hauls him by the arm back onto the bus, and the lingering thoughts of the other passengers cloud in on him. Kanie rubs his temples and settles into the seat, glaring daggers at the girl across the aisle. But Sento Isuzu just faces straight, like some demented robot intent on making him do things he hates.

Whatever. He stares out the window instead. Along the horizon line, the edges of a castle come into view.

Kanie snorts. A love hotel. Who the hell would even buy a castle anyway? Shady-ass love hotel proprietors, clearly. But you'd think that the dumb theme park would include a clause about that, like something about knocking the building down rather than remodeled for disreputable purposes. It's just...

"Sloppy." He wrinkles his nose.

"Excuse me?" Sento turns her head a fraction, watching him but also not watching him, the way producers and execs would pretend they weren't paying attention to him so they'd be able to see what he was like when he thought no one was looking.

He's seen this shit too often to fall for it.

"This operation." Kanie says. "The whole thing. It's been conducted by someone with zero managerial experience, no sense of order and priority, and no passion. It's sloppy. I can't even say it's been run into the ground because no one cared enough to run it properly to begin with."

For a moment, he's sure Sento flinches. But no, she's too blank, too hardcore for that.

"Maybe you should see more of the circumstances." She says, and the bus clatters past the misnamed stop, and to the next one.

-o-

At least if it were a dream he wouldn't be so preoccupied with that kiss.

He hangs back around the gate and its rusted letters. A brilliant park, huh? Whatever kind of fairies live in here, they're not the kind that are good with people, that's for sure. And it's not like he's a paragon at that- what Sento said was true. He's 16, he's been going to this school for ages, and he doesn't have friends or a girlfriend. People see just enough of him to see what they don't like.

Kanie runs a hand through his hair, and his palm grazes his lips.

When you haven't had other people in your personal space for a while, you forget what it's like until it happens again and everything becomes explosive. When he was an actor, everybody was in his face. Make-up artists (make-up on a child? why the hell not), directors, wardrobe artists, producers, casting directors, execs, photogs, cameramen, other actors- you get used to all these strange people pulling you places and telling you things, tapping you on the shoulder like you're friends.

And when that stops, abruptly, it's like you must have come down with some terrible, contagious disease.

Maybe that's why he keeps replaying that girl over and over in his head. Over-elaborate gown, gloves, tiara, those details get lost. What Kanie remembers is long eyelashes, a nervous laugh, and a certain kind of kindness that she'd look away and then ask him to please hold still.

But most of all, what he remembers is how her lips were so warm and how she was so impossibly close.

Kanie slams his hand onto the stone archway. God, what is his problem?

What was her problem? Who the hell even asks the person they're going to kiss to hold still?

"Kanie-kun." Sento. She's waiting under the arch, expressionless as ever.

Kanie frowns. He's an actor. He's been taught how to read people since he was a kid, pick up on the cues, present the appropriate ones for an audience to believe you. But Sento doesn't do any of that. She's like a program executing whatever task she's been set, ruthless and unimaginative. "I'm coming." He says, finally.

"This way." She walks back under the arch, glancing inside at a box that displays small numbers in red. The guard waves at him, like he's any other guest.

Kanie stuffs his hands into his pocket and follows. He follows her past all these terrible rides and terrible attractions, all the way up to the one place that isn't utterly horrifying, which is what Sento calls the Hanging Garden. Which, also is where that girl lives.

Great.

-o-

He says he'll do it, and he doesn't even know why.

He kicks an old can along the midway, and it bounces off siding of booths and attractions that have faded with time. Everything here is so damn ancient he's not surprised that they're having trouble running it. This is just what happens when you build an amusement park and then someone pulls the economic rug out from under you: it goes bust. It's not shocking, it's not even bad.

It just happens.

And he's supposed to stop it?

He punts the can down farther. God damn all of this, he's so dumb.

"Kanie-kun?" Sento's following him, at a discrete pace. "Why are you abusing an aluminum container?"

"I-" His hands curl into fists. I have made a terrible decision, maybe. I have an stupid obsession because I have been lonelier than you could ever imagine. I can't believe I'm doing this. "I think this park is disgusting."

Her nose almost wrinkles. "Yes, perhaps it is."

"That's it?" He whirls on her. "That's all the reaction I get out of you? 'Perhaps it is?' It's horrifying. Of course no one comes here. Why would they? There's trash blowing through the alleys between booths and games, half the rides don't work, there's no working water, and let's not forget about our neighbors the love hotel."

He barks out a laugh.

Sento, though, is relentlessly composed. "Then why did you agree to help?"

Kanie stops in his stride up the midway. In the distance, the ferris wheel turns in slow, rainbow circles, and the Garden glimmers behind it in the sunset. He has the magic to read minds and he hopes in this moment that no one else does.

"Because I'm bored." He musters up a sardonic smile. "And I'm looking forward to seeing the looks on your faces when you see how fast I turn this crapshow around."

All good acting is, essentially, a lie. The way you convince an audience is to believe the lie yourself.

Somewhere, a girl in a long dress is sitting at her table on a balcony, watching the sunset. His skin feels too warm, and there is a not-small part of him that just wants to put the facade away for once, and just be real.

"Good." Sento motions him on. "Then you can start by sorting through the General Manager's office."

"Are you serious?" He groans, but follows her anyway.

Maybe he's just gotten good enough at lying to himself to think he really can turn this around. But a part of him wants to think he was telling the truth, that he can fix this park and that, for once, it wasn't just an act.


End file.
